1. Princeton economist/partisan NYT columnist Paul Krugman asserts that the GOP is trying to destroy the U.S. economy.
2. He says the Democratic "stimulus" spending plan is not nearly big ENOUGH.
3. He says Japan experienced a “lost decade” of deflation and stagnation in the 1990s — and the only thing that let Japan escape from its trap was a global boom that boosted the nation’s exports.
4. He has nothing to say about the story in his own paper that Japan's 1980s spending boom was a failure. (Probably wasn't big enough.)
5. He says "Count me among those who think that the president made a big mistake in his initial approach, that his attempts to transcend partisanship ended up empowering politicians who take their marching orders from Rush Limbaugh." (In other words, Obama should take his marching orders from Paul Krugman.)
6. He says Obama "must not shy away from pointing out that those who stand in the way of his plan, in the name of a discredited economic philosophy, are putting the nation’s future at risk. The American economy is on the edge of catastrophe, and much of the Republican Party is trying to push it over that edge."
In other words, those who do not bow down and worship Paul Krugman and his faith-based economic theory of huge government and massive deficit spending are, for all intents and purposes, traitors to their country.
What a great argument!
nothing says economic revival like dumping money into government programs. Maybe I'll get a free condom out of it in 2009 - naah, it'll have to wait until 2010.
ReplyDeleteGil - Paul Krugman won a Nobel Prize in Economics. He's got a lot more standing than Rush and you when it comes to identifying "a discredited economic philosophy".
ReplyDeleteKrugman won as Nobel Prize in Economics. So did libertarian and free-marketer Milton Friedman.
ReplyDeleteYassar Arafat won one for "Peace." And Rigoberta Menchu won one for literature for a biography that turned out to be filled with lies.
Defend Krugman's arguments don't cite his credentials. That's lame.
Gil - I couldn't find you on the list of Pulitzer winners.
ReplyDeleteAs for Krugman's arguments, he is arguing against continuing a GOP economic philosophy that has failed. His main criticism of Obama is that he needs to take off the gloves and realize that the GOP leadership puts tax breaks for their rich friends over the well being of the country. Krugman thinks the stimulus should be bigger. He's might be right, but politically Obama will have to do it as a follow up later.
What's YOUR argument, Gil? More tax breaks that got us into this problem?
Tax breaks didn't get us into this mess. Housing policy, overborrowing and loose credit did.
ReplyDeleteAbout half of the non-stimulus crap in the stimulus package could be cut but won't be.
Even Obama admits the thing has too much pork. But its his fault for letting the libs in Congress write it and not getting his own hands dirty.
I haven't won a Pulitzer prize. But my dad has. And I know a lot more about this stuff than he does. Just ask him.
"Count me among those who think that the president made a big mistake in his initial approach, that his attempts to transcend partisanship ended up empowering politicians who take their marching orders from Rush Limbaugh."
ReplyDelete...the honeymoon is almost over...
He says Obama "must not shy away from pointing out that those who stand in the way of his plan, in the name of a discredited economic philosophy, are putting the nation’s future at risk.
...in other words, if you're not with us, you're against us. Sound familiar?
After Al Gore won the Nobel Prize for his global warming scam, everyone has a right to question the brainpower of those goofy Swedes.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the acorn falls very far from the tree and remains a nut.
ReplyDeleteGil - This is the other Bob weighing in. The painter. First let me say that I've always enjoyed your Dads work at the Daily News. I enjoy reading you too. Rarely agree with you, but enjoy reading you. Who knows. I hope theres a Pulitzer in your future too. I think you and Bob are both right. The way I see it, tax breaks for the rich, overspending by the middle class, predatory lending, and corporate greed, all combined for the perfect economic storm. I don't believe the poor of this country were much of a factor. You might disagree with that. I don't know what the answer is, but I do know for a fact that while Obama was telling us that the economy was tanking, McCain was telling us that the fundamentals of our economy were strong. And that was the guy that you were supporting. Now we have Limbaugh calling for Obama's failure. MAybe the real traitor here is Limbaugh.
ReplyDeleteBob,
ReplyDeleteI don't blame the poor for this either. I do believe politicians, both Republican and Democrat, had a rather large hand in the failure of the mortgage system by encouraging low standards for loans. I think that is beyond argument at this point, and it was more Democrats than Republicans that were interested in seeing unqualified borrowers get loans.
As for Limbaugh, he said he wasn't rooting for Obama's socialist policies to succeed and was hoping to seem THEM fail. That a little different than rooting for Obama to fail. If Obama would follow centrist, free market ideas, even Rush wouldn't stop supporting them just because Obama did.
I'm a little concerned about this OTHER Bob trading on your name to post here. Do you have any concerns?
Gil - I guess I could post under "Baaahb", but that would interfere with the level of maturity experiment that I'm conducting on C. Scott Shields.
ReplyDeleteSince I've been blogging under "Bob" for about a year, maybe the other Bob can use an initial after his name. What do you say Bob?
As for Limbaugh, I'm not buying it. I think Limbaugh would love nothing more than to see this President be a failure at everything he does. That's the nature of a person like Limbaugh, and I believe you're aware of this. To quote Bill Bennett "The locution 'I want him to fail' is not what you say the first week the man's been inaugurated." If you have any doubts as to Limbaughs feelings about Obama, this Limbaugh quote say's it all "We are being told that we have to hope he succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles, bend over forward, backward, whichever, because his father was black, because this is the first black president."
I also believe that both parties were responsible for the meltdown, but Dems are more responsible? I'm not buying that either. The Republicans were alays the party of deregulation. The initial changes in the loan business, and if I remember right, this goes back to the Carter administration, were to prevent red lining by mortgage and insurance companies. A legitimate and nobel venture. NPR ran a great program explaining the meltdown. Fair and balanced, if you will. Deregulation was a big factor.
Gil - I liked what Jay Leno had to say about Limbaughs quote. He said "do you think there's any chance in hell Rush Limbaugh could bend over and grab his ankles?"
ReplyDelete